Ode to a Man

I found out last week that the man who was my boss and mentor at the jail, Dale Warrington, died last October from lung cancer at the age of 57. I had been trying to locate him off-and-on for a couple years to thank him and express my appreciation for how he influenced and inspired me as a therapist and a human being. His number was unlisted, and at the last known places of employment I had for him they didn't even know who he was.

Here's his obit:  http://obits.abqjournal.com/obits/show/209923

I probably shouldn't be surprised. Dale was a hard drinking, Marlboro-smoking, Harley-riding man. I last saw him in December of 2000--Christ, has it already been a decade?--and without knowing the details around his death, I have little reason to believe he changed his habits over the years. In fact, it would be a fair to assume quite the contrary; if anything, he most likely died exactly the way he lived. And yet the news of his passing shocked the hell out of me, as death often does when a larger-than-life figure finally meets his maker.

Years ago while a grad student at Naropa, I was having a discussion/debate with a friend who had been around during the wild Trungpa years. Chogyam Trugnpa Rinpoche was a Tibetan Buddhist monk, the  eleventh Trungpa Tulku as well as the holder of both the Karma Kagyu and Nyingma lineages. He was the founder of the Naropa Institute as well as the inspiration for a large number of meditation centers around the U.S. and abroad. He also happened to be a sake-swilling alcoholic and sex addict who, it was alleged by more than one person, not only slept with many of his female students but a not insignificant number of male devotees as well.  I was told the Rincpoche died (from liver disease at the age of 48) while screaming from his deathbed for more sake.

I felt outraged from what I had learned of Trungpa's escapades, and was fed-up with the hypocrisy of his ex-students, many of whom were teachers and administrators at Naropa. They would dismiss Chogyam's behavior as "crazy wisdom," often doing so with wistful expressions on their faces, presumably longing for the good old days.

However, not everyone was wistful. One woman I spoke to was, to put it mildly, no longer a Trungpa fan. She stated that some of the men of the community (including her own husband) encouraged their women to offer themselves to their "teacher," as if bedding down with the Rinpoche (Precious Jewel) was some sort of blessing.

I asked the friend with whom I was having the debate how he could defend such behavior when if it were coming from me (or anybody else for that matter), he would have cut the person out of his life.
 "What is it," I said, "that made this man so special in your eyes?"

He thought about it for a good 30 seconds before saying three words that have stuck with me to this day. "He was fearless," he said.

As unseemly as Trungpa's behavior could be, he never tried to hide who he was. If he wanted to do donuts on the grass field behind the school in his stretch limo, well, hey, crazy wisdom. If he showed up for a dharma talk an hour late (and drunk) before giving what I've been told were often remarkable seven minute discourses, okay then.

As much as I was disgusted by what I learned of Trungpa's antics, his books were (and are) pure insight and light. What I learned from him (and other teachers in my life) was the importance of learning to separate the man--any man--from the spiritual being underneath. In all honesty, I would have loved to have met the Rinpoche. Here's his wiki page. It's a good read: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/C%C3%B6gyam_Trungpa

How is this related to Dale Warrington?

Dale was one of perhaps three people I have known who would fit the description of  fearlessly themselves. He lived his life full throttle. He did not try to hide the fact that he drank a pint of JD every night (and more on weekends); nor did he even bother to feign a desire to quit his pack-and-a-half-a-day cigarette habit. The vast majority of the time, when Dale spoke, he did so in a booming baritone voice that filled the room. His voice carried, in other words. And while this alone isn't particularly of note, when Dale did speak, it was often without the aid of internal editing or filters. Needless to say, his judgment was far from impeccable. Dale could (and did) fuck-up with the best of them, but when he did dive into a situation, he jumped in full-bore, with both rattle snake boots.

To wit: He once referred to his boss at the mental health center as a "conniving, polyester
suit-wearing, back-stabbing, bitch."

Not a big deal behind closed doors, but true to form, Dale voiced this not terribly ambiguous opinion in his typical unmuted tones which, as a rule, could be heard quite easily from 75 paces. He also happened to do so with the front door to our office wide open. It remained a mystery whose ears overheard Dale's comment that day--his enemies at the jail were legion--but the comment did indeed make it back to his boss leaving, shall we say, a few fences to mend.

I can not put too fine a point on it: the words subtle and Dale Warrington rarely bumped into each other in the same sentence. To some, his behavior might be said to reflect a certain lack of tact to the point of foolhardiness. But I would argue that Dale's willingness to speak his mind in that booming voice of his and then stand behind it regardless of who was in the vicinity, reflected a type of courage that is rare in our society. It said, What you see is exactly what you get. If you have a problem with this, it is your problem.


I met Dale six months out of grad school. A friend told me that the Mental Health Center had contracted with the jail to provide psych services, and that they were hiring a slew of full-time counselors. I applied, and so desperate were they to get people to work at that toilet bowl of a facility that I tried to sabotage my own hiring by answering the drug portion of the background check form truthfully. I listed the 11-12 different drugs I had used or ever tried, and even admitted that, yes, for a brief time I did indeed deal marijuana. Nobody said a peep.

What they don't tell you in your graduate school training--thank G-d--is that when a budding counselor passed through the doors of whatever institution they attended for the final time, they would be entering into the world with a diploma in one hand, a world of debt in the other, and almost no counseling skills whatsoever. The real education would come afterward. It would come from working in the field and stumbling around some agency while trying to help people or, at least, attempting to follow the Hypocratic oath of doing no harm.  The education would come during client case reviews and from the occasional scrap of positive feedback from a clients; and it would come after even more stumbling around.

My mantra back when I fist started at the jail was: Please, G-d, let this person be alive when I get into work tomorrow. I hated everything about working there. The smell of recirculated air and sweat, the cluh-clang of sliding doors, the dishonest, manipulative inmates and (sometimes) corrections staff, and the guy who pressed his face against the one-way glass to see into the control room where I was standing and shouted that he "wanted me." And if all that weren't bad enough, here was this guy with an Amish beard, cowboy boots and an endless supply of garish ties and a megaphone voice who I was looking at calling my boss for the foreseeable future. I was in hell.

One morning a few weeks in,  I was out on the patio staring up at the sky through the barbwire and chain link roof lamenting my employment fate when Dale joined me for stress-relieving smoke.  He took a seat and lit up without a word until at last, I lowered my gaze to find him studying me with a Mona Lisa smile on his goateed face.

I looked at him, he looked at me, I looked at him. "What?" I said at last.

"Tommy," he boomed, spontaneously using my childhood name, "where were you born?"

"Uhm, Milwaukee, why?"

"Any brothers and sisters?"

This line of questioning went on for roughly two cigarettes or, in laymen terms, about ten minutes. For reasons I never quite understood, out of the blue, Dale seemed to have taken a shine to me. What I found out later was that he did not take shines lightly. To be on his shit list was, as far as I could tell, to be there forever. If you worked hard, were honest, and cared about helping the mentally ill, you were golden in Dale's book, but if you were there to slough-off and collect a paycheck he could make things a little ... unpleasant. Okay, quite unpleasant.

Another story I want to tell about him because I can, and because it sent a bolt of admiration down my spine when he told me, occurred prior to Dale's working at the jail while he was a nurse at the mental health center.  One day, an out-of-his-mind, floridly psychotic behemoth (and why the paranoid schizophrenics are often huge, burly me is beyond me) was running amok on one of the units.

In a mental health setting, employees are expected and trained to help restrain out-of-control patients; but this guy wasn't going down and had already hurt 3-4 people. As the psychotic man (or "toon" as Dale liked to call them) took a swing at another psych tech, he slipped and fell. Dale, who had just arrived on the scene, saw his opening. He galloped up to the scrum like the cavalry and kicked the guy full force on the side of the head, briefly knocking him out. The giant was quickly restrained, medicated, and locked down. Dale, of course, was reprimanded for his behavior, but oddly or no, was not fired. Afterward, he told me, he and the schizophrenic became good friends.

I believe Dale was able to keep his job with the Mental Health Center (and at the jail) for as long as he did because his "polyester-wearing, back-stabbing bitch" of a supervisor astutely recognized that--like him or hate him--there was a indeed a place for such men as Dale; men who seemingly reveled in taking on the jobs that no one else wanted; men who were the fixer-uppers in dirty situations; men who were the mental health equivalent of the Wolfe in Pulp Fiction.

As stated so beautifully in his obituary, Dale Warrington's priorities lay first and always with the well being of the mentally ill. In fact, the only time I ever remembered him modulating his voice was when he was sitting across from a one of the toon inmates.  He would take a seat at the table across from some angry bipolar or schizophrenic man, lean in, lower his voice and ask how he could be of service. Dale would listen for as long as the person needed, the very picture of deference and sincerity, as if it were the most important thing he could possibly be doing. And it was. He would generally end things with a handshake or back slap, and a quick, "Okay, bueno."

The presence he brought to his interactions were without either affectation or manipulation. Dale genuinely cared for and respected these downtroddenest of the downtrodden, and did so without a hint of patronization.

His big heart was unquestioned, if not lacking in even a hint of sentimentality. He had a simple rule-of-thumb that I still go by in my practice today: Mental illness is no excuse. "Tommy," he said, "we give them the best care possible, treat them with complete respect and dignity, but the mentally ill are responsible for their actions and deeds just like the rest of us."

I have been struggling with this blog entry for five days trying to do this man justice, and yet still feel that my words have fallen hopelessly short . The four plus years I spent on the psych unit with Dale were life changing for me--both as a therapist and a man. It was a place where I did things and handled situations I never imagined I could or would. With his undying faith and support, I started to believe in myself in ways I never had. Many a time I ran up to Dale with some perceived problem or dilemma. He would simply smile, slap me on the back, and say in his booming voice, "I have faith in you, Tommy. Whatever you decide is fine."

The last time I saw him was my final day at the detention center. Typically, when someone left the team, there was a potluck and a grand send-off. But when party time arrived, Dale was nowhere to be found. I'd seen him earlier in the day, but he took off without saying goodbye. I have always viewed this as both intentional and unconscious on his part. Dale and I had gotten quite close over the years. I  always wondered if Dale's absence was his reaction to my departure--the betrayal of the son leaving the fold against his father's wishes. An act of love, in other words. I'd like to think I had his blessing.